


The Name

by Happyorogeny



Series: The Drow [9]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Forgotten Realms, The Legend of Drizzt Series - R. A. Salvatore
Genre: Alcohol, Gen, M/M, alcohol mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-06
Updated: 2019-07-06
Packaged: 2020-06-23 15:12:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19703959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Happyorogeny/pseuds/Happyorogeny
Summary: Drow language has its subtleties.





	The Name

There was a lot to be seen in a name and in how it was spoken. Jarlaxle, by drow standards, was an odd one. At first glance it seemed like a mark of respect. Men were usually given short names, easy to remember or call out in combat. It was a thing of affection to name a son something grander. 

But Jarlaxle was tricky to say, a word of hard angles and sliding sounds. Awkward. 

Meaning that he was awkward, his very existence a challenge. And the shortened version, Jarl, was both an insult in its diminutive nature and audibly similar to a phrase often snapped at strangers. It meant; you are not welcome. You are not one of us. You are not family, are not welcome in this house. 

Whoever his mother had been, she was an efficient woman. 

Jarlaxle sighed and shifted in his nest of blankets. Revere escaped him, sleep escaped him. A dozen political concerns sat at the doorstep to his mind, a dozen jobs, a dozen interactions that needed careful balance if he was to emerge unscathed. He sighed and kneaded his good hand into the plush fibres of the quilt, feeling out those sigils of healing and rest embroidered into the hems.

He needed to rest. He needed to – he needed something. Jarlaxle had always needed something. The security and power offered by the Bregan D’aerthe sufficed, well enough. But sometimes he thought about Zak, and about Drizzt, and wondered if being loved felt like power. 

And Goddess, what was it like to have love and power both?

It’s just the alcohol, he told himself. He had sat up in a drinking game with two priestesses, and won the ownership of a lesser consort from them. A man of rare magic skill, one he wanted in his entourage. 

His men all said his name differently, or spoke of him using honourifics. A bastardised version of the word used for Matron. Some of them, when drunk or feeling vulnerable, when he was having a close conversation, used the word for brother. Jarlaxle allowed that, occasionally. So many of the mercenaries came to him broken, in need of comfort and connection. Allowing them to connect to him, even briefly, accelerated their recovery. Improved their loyalty. 

There was no word for Father, as Artemis had in his language. Only for Consort.

What was it like, to have a son, to have a child? Jarlaxle didn’t know. He did not need to know. Had ensured long ago that such a thing would never be a problem. He didn’t care to have it used against him, as had happened with Zak – with – 

It was just the alcohol. He needed to sleep. 

Artemis looked so peaceful when he slept, tucked away in whatever little corner he had found for himself. Jarlaxle envied him. The men thought him strange for such an attachment. A human! It would have been better if he had tried to breed with a demon, or even a drow man. But they didn’t see, didn’t realise. Artemis was more free than any of them. He had his own tangles of the mind. But not in the way a drow man suffered with them, not in the way- 

Gods. He wanted to go to him now, watch him, speak to him. Watch how he was, how he moved. 

His men still weren’t quite sure what to do with Artemis. If they hated him, despised him, were indifferent to him. If they were surprised by how similar to them a human could be. They couldn’t quite say his name. And so they shortened it to a drow word that meant knife, Arax. Specifically, a secret blade, a concealed one, something only revealed in the case of great danger, of an emergency. 

Artemis had looked almost pleased when Jarlaxle had told him so. The edges of his eyes had softened, just so, and then he had scoffed and turned back to waxing his boots and armour. Jarlaxle rather liked what a human voice did to his name. Drax, it sounded like. Drax, Drax. It sounded to him like a little desert bird calling to its far distant mate, its voice echoing over rolling sand dunes and empty savanna. 

He rather liked it, even though Artemis stumbled over the softer syllables. It didn’t mean, we do not want you. It was just a name in Artemis’s mouth, no different to anyone else, no worse than anyone else. No more unwelcome. Not an awkward thing, an obstacle to be worked around. 

And as for his own self, he was what he was. And he wanted so very badly to know what he was, when he was not here. 

Soon, he told himself. Darkness nibbled at the edges of his thoughts. Sleep was on its way. 

Soon.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this, come find me on tumblr!


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